Articles for 2004

January 2004 Energy stewardship is as easy as 1-2-3!

Justice and sustainability. These are the values upheld by the Energy Policy Statement of the United Methodist Church.

Only energy use that will “… distribute fairly the benefits, burdens, and hazards of energy production and consumption, taking into consideration those not yet born as well as the living” will be just.

Only energy use that “…will not: (a) deplete the earth’s resources in such a way that our descendants will not be able to continue human society at the level that is adequate for a good quality of life, and (b) pollute the environment to such an extent that human life cannot be sustained in the future” will be sustainable.

Justice and sustainability are the values guiding our energy use, but what can our congregations do in accordance with these values? Our Energy Policy Statement goes on to say (emphasis is mine):

We support strenuous efforts to conserve energy and increase energy efficiency. A transition to energy efficiency and renewable energy sources will combat global warming, protect human health, create new jobs, and ensure a secure, affordable energy future. Economists have concluded that a greater increase in end-use energy can be gained through conservation and energy efficiency than through any single new source of fuel. Furthermore, conservation is nonpolluting and job producing. We include under conservation: insulation, co-generation, recycling, public transportation, more efficient motors in appliances and automobiles, as well as the elimination of waste, and a more simplified lifestyle. The technology for such steps is already known and commercially available; it requires only dissemination of information and stronger public support, including larger tax incentives than are presently available.

~ ADOPTED 1980; AMENDED AND READOPTED 2000; See Social Principles ¶160B.

And this is only a small part of our Energy Policy Statement! These guidelines are important, but when it comes down to implementing them, congregations might justifiably feel overwhelmed.

Taking action in your congregation

One energy stewardship program that has been used successfully in a number of congregations, including many United Methodist congregations, is the 1-2-3 Response to Global Warming Campaign. The toolkit for using this program is free and available on the NCNY Environmental Justice website (given below). This program can be an important first step for your congregation to use energy in a way that promotes justice and sustainability.

Anyone who has ever organized any program knows that conducting a successful campaign in church or elsewhere is rarely simple or easy. The “easy” part of the 1-2-3 program refers to the participants’ actions, not the organizer’s! However, this one is as simple as they come.

The toolkit includes keys for a successful campaign, a suggested schedule, a sign to use with a light bulb demo, pledge forms, follow-up survey, and other useful materials. A commitment on the part of the organizer and a small committee is certainly needed, but the work should not be overwhelming.

And what are the 1-2-3 actions congregation members pledge to take? Reduce the home thermostat setting by 1 degree in the winter and increase it by 1 degree in the summer. Reduce speed by 2 mph from one’s usual speed when driving over 60 mph. And replace 3 extensively-used incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs. These actions are as easy as 1-2-3 for your congregation, but they represent an important first step toward conserving energy and using it efficiently. They also represent first steps toward justice and sustainability in our use of energy. The toolkit provides information on the next steps people can take.

If your congregation uses these materials, please let me know about your experience. What worked well? What didn’t? Has the program been a good first step toward greater energy stewardship for your congregation’s members?

Implementing the Social Principles

Our United Methodist Social Principles have been developed through the prayerful and painstaking work of many United Methodist clergy and lay people representing Conferences from all over the world. This document provides important principles for living our faith, but only if we make the effort to implement these principles in our daily lives. This 1-2-3 program is one way we can implement an important policy in the Social Principles. It’s also a way we can carry the principles of our faith into our daily lives and create a world that is more just and sustainable.

February 2004 Coffee, tea, cocoa, and bananas

These would make an odd, but fair meal – Fair Trade, that is.

What is Fair Trade? It is a certification that ensures that a product meets internationally recognized standards for fair trade. More than that, though, trade that is fair works with small farmers as partners, and pays them a fair price regardless of fluctuations in the market by eliminating the middlemen. It allows farmers to work with dignity and to provide for their children.

Coffee, tea, and cocoa

So far, over 630 United Methodist congregations are participating in the UMCOR Coffee Project, and last year they purchased over 10,000 pounds of fairly traded coffee! Many other denominations are also serving a “cup of justice” at their church functions.

Through its Interfaith Program, Equal Exchange contributes to UMCOR for each case of coffee sold, so your dollars go even farther in working for justice in the world. (Note: There are other places to buy Fair Trade, shade-grown, organic coffee in addition to Equal Exchange, including an increasing number of grocery stores, but Equal Exchange is partnering with UMCOR. However, any certified Fair Trade product has met the same standards.)

Choose coffee that is not only Fair Trade, but also shade-grown and organic, and you make your coffee Justice Coffee.

Shade-grown coffee is grown in the shade rather than in sun plantations that have been created by cutting down rainforest. Thus, buying shade-grown coffee helps preserve the winter home of our own migratory birds, such as the ruby-throated hummingbird.

Growing coffee in the sun requires the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. Buying organic products prevents the pollution of soil and water and protects farm workers’ health. Equal Exchange offers coffee that has all three important characteristics: Fair Trade, shade-grown, and organic.

Make sure you serve a cup of justice to people in your congregation who don’t drink coffee: offer Fair Trade tea and cocoa, too! Equal Exchange also sells Fair Trade, shade-grown, organic baking cocoa.

Bananas and …

And what about those bananas? Until now, only coffee, tea, and cocoa have been easily available as Fair Trade products. Soon, however, bananas will be joining the list, and additional products such as honey, mangoes, cut flowers, rice, sugar, and orange juice will be available after that. Now that the independent fair-trade certifier TransFair USA has sufficient staff and infrastructure, the pace of certifying products will accelerate. This is good news for the hard-working people in developing countries who deserve a fair wage for their labor.

Certifying products is just half the story, of course. The other half is that consumers need to be aware that these products exist and then choose to buy them. To paraphrase Bill McKibben, the faith community is the one institution in society that understands something other than financial gain, and so we can be one of the most effective advocates for Fair Trade. This is not charity, however. Buying Fair Trade products is an act of justice.

Start by serving Justice Coffee, cocoa, and tea at church functions. Sell it to your congregation’s members for their own personal use. All of these products make great fundraiser products as well. Learn more about Fair Trade and about new Fair Trade products as they become available. Supporting Fair Trade with your dollars is one effective (and delicious!) way for your congregation to work for economic and environmental justice in the world.

For more information or to order: go to Equal Exchange. Their online ordering and service has proven to be very easy and trouble-free.

March 2004 - Interfaith Power, Interfaith Light, Interfaith Power and Light

Power and Light. For those who have worked productively with the interfaith community, this phrase brings to mind the power of the faith community working together to reach common goals. It also brings to mind the enlightenment one can find from sharing our unique faith perspectives on issues of common interest.

Now add “New York” to the phrase, and you have the name of a recently-formed organization which joins a national movement to promote good stewardship of God’s gift of energy.

New York Interfaith Power and Light (NY IP&L) will bring the power and enlightenment of interfaith effort to energy issues. This organization joins other state-wide Interfaith Power and Light (IP&L – pronounced “ippel”) organizations, such as those in California, Connecticut, Georgia, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and Wisconsin … and more IP&Ls are being created.

A little history

This national movement started in California. In response to the Episcopal Church’s position on stewardship of Creation, Rev. Sally Bingham, an Episcopal priest, started Episcopal Power and Light to put their faith into action. This soon grew into California Interfaith Power and Light, and has now become a national Interfaith Power and Light movement.

Why?

Why should churches be concerned about their energy use? As our UM Energy Policy Statement says, “(W)e support strenuous efforts to conserve energy and increase energy efficiency. A transition to energy efficiency and renewable energy sources will combat global warming, protect human health, create new jobs, and ensure a secure, affordable energy future. Economists have concluded that a greater increase in end-use energy can be gained through conservation and energy efficiency than through any single new source of fuel. Furthermore, conservation is nonpolluting and job producing.”

In short, responsible energy use promotes justice and sustainability.

United Methodist connections

Although the IP&L movement started in the Episcopal Church, its goals mirror those of the Social Principles of the United Methodist Church. In fact, NYS IP&L will help UM churches implement our Energy Stewardship Policy which states that “(A)ll United Methodist churches, annual conferences, general boards and agencies are to be models for energy conservation …”

We love New York

Compared to other states, New York State has some important advantages: the New York State Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) and renewable energy choice.

NYSERDA - NYSERDA offers many financial incentives and rebates for taking energy conservation and efficiency measures. Churches are eligible to apply for any of their Commercial programs. Why not so start with an energy audit? The cost of the audit is applied toward the cost of any recommended work, so the audit is essentially free.

Energy choice – Unlike many other states, most people in NYS can sign up for clean, renewable energy just by notifying their utility company. For a small surcharge, your church or your congregation’s members can promote justice and sustainability by choosing to purchase wind-generated or other forms of green electricity.

Become a member of NY IP&L!

Any congregation can become a member of NY IP&L. It’s easy. Just go to the NY IP&L website and email your interest in joining. All that is required is to sign a covenant to support the mission of NY IP&L - to “promote faithful and just stewardship of God’s creation through energy conservation, energy efficiency, and the use of renewable energy” - and to pledge to take one of the action steps listed. In return, NY IP&L will send you a packet of information to help you fulfill your pledge. Most important, you'll be on the way to becoming a good steward of God's creation.

April 2004 - Earth Day Sunday 2004: Life-giving Breath of God

Each year the Eco-Justice Working Group of the National Council of Churches produces excellent materials available for your use on Earth Day Sunday. The theme this year is “Life-giving Breath of God: Protecting the Sacred Gift of Air.” Earth Day Sunday is April 25 this year, but you can designate any Sunday to explore this theme. These materials include sermon starters, background on the issue, a liturgy/call to worship bulletin insert, and ideas for taking action. You can obtain them online or by calling the NCC Eco-Justice Working Group offices at (202) 544-2350.

The more energy we use, the more electricity power plants produce. The more electricity power plants produce, the more air pollution they create. Conserving energy and using it more efficiently is thus an important way we can protect the sacred gift of air.

Exit Signs

Responsible national energy policy and personal lifestyle changes are important, but we can conserve a lot of energy (and save significant amounts of $$$) right in our own church buildings. One of the simplest things we can do relates to something we seldom think about: our exit signs!

Have you looked at the innards of your church's exit signs? Chances are you'll find that there are incandescent light bulbs in there. We hardly notice exit signs, but they're using electricity 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. That means that they're creating power plant emissions that cause health problems every minute of the year. That also means that you're needlessly spending a lot of money for that electricity every minute of the year. Exit signs are important to have, but why use more electricity than necessary?

Case Study

Recently, one church in the Troy Conference checked out their exit signs. Their building had about 20 exit signs, each of which was using about 30 watts of electricity (the bulbs used varied from sign to sign). By replacing these incandescent bulbs with LED bulbs, each of these signs will be using only about 2 watts of electricity instead of about 30, a savings of about 250 kWh/year for each exit sign. Assuming 10c per kWh, this is a savings of about $25 per exit sign or almost $500 a year for all 20 signs! And there are additional savings since LED bulbs can be expected to last at least 10 years instead of the relatively short life of incandescent bulbs.

The new LED replacement bulbs for the 20 signs cost $225 (which included the shipping), but this is a one-time cost. The $500 savings continues year after year after year! These savings will actually be greater if the electricity rates go up (probably a pretty safe prediction).

Saving this much money is just good stewardship of our financial resources. But even more important is that these LED exit signs are preventing the emission of power plant emissions such as sulfur dioxide, mercury, and particulate matter. These emissions cause or exacerbate a variety of health problems ranging from heart problems to asthma. They also cause acid rain. Emissions that can be prevented by doing something as simple as replacing the incandescent bulbs in our exit signs with LED bulbs.

Your own savings, of course, will vary depending on how many exit signs you have, your current bulbs, your type of exit signs, and so on, but it's clear that it's worth doing. It's also clear that each day you delay, you're losing money and causing unnecessary power plant emissions.

The church in the Troy Conference bought their bulbs online from 4Exits (http://www.4exits.com - click on LED Retrofit Kits on the left-hand menu, or call toll-free 1-866-345-4837), but other companies sell them, too.

P.S. Don't stop at upgrading your church exit signs. Your workplace probably has exit signs that could be upgraded or replaced. The EPA reports that there are more than 100 million exit signs in the US, and these signs lit by incandescent bulbs use 30-35 billion kWh of energy each year. If all US companies switched to Energy Star exit signs, they would save $75 million in electricity costs (and prevent a lot of harmful emissions.)

May 2004 - First, do no harm

“First, do no harm.” Usually this is an admonition to doctors treating patients. But this warning applies equally to our home and church landscaping practices.

As a habitat gardener, I try to provide as many habitat elements as I can in my home landscape. Just by providing food, water, cover, and a place to raise young, my yard has come alive! Besides providing for birds and other small creatures, it gives much joy to me and my family, as well as people visiting or passing by my yard. Even people and churches that don’t have habitat gardens, though, can “first, do no harm” to God’s creation by their landscaping practices.

Eliminate pesticides

God provided all we need for beautiful plantings – why do we need pesticides? Many people assume “if they sell it, it must be safe.” But pesticides are generally considered innocent until proven guilty; hence, widely used pesticides are often withdrawn from the market when they’re finally studied.

As the Latin suffix “-cide” indicates, these chemicals are designed to kill. They kill insects (as well as birds, frogs, and other wildlife) immediately. But even when used as directed, numerous studies indicate they’re unhealthy for pets and people, though the damage may not show up for years. Children especially are at risk because of their small and growing bodies as well as their tendency to play on the grass and put things in their mouth.

Amazingly, we use these toxic chemicals merely for aesthetic purposes: to have a nice lawn, and plants with no little holes in their leaves. Is this notion of perfection worth the risk to our children? To God’s creation?

My yard is 100% pesticide-free, yet by using organic gardening techniques it has blooms in abundance and very healthy plants. Would God have created a world that required the use of toxic chemicals? First, do no harm: resolve to eliminate those pesticides!

Eliminate invasive plants

God created a wonderful diversity of plant life - not just individual plants, but entire plant communities. These communities have insect predators and a host of other factors that ensure that each functions as part of the whole. By bringing plants from another part of the world into our own, though, we bypass these protections. A prime example is purple loosestrife. This plant is perfectly well behaved in its native setting, but there are no natural controls on its growth here in New York, and it’s a menace to our own plant communities.

Most people are familiar with this pest, but many people don’t realize there are other plants causing similar problems. You may have some of them in your own church or home landscaping! Norway maple, autumn and Russian olive, Japanese barberry, Japanese honeysuckle, shrub honeysuckle, Oriental bittersweet, buckthorn, porcelainberry, and black locust are all on the Invasive Plant Council’s Top Twenty list of invasive plants for New York State. Incredibly, they are still being sold, even as they cause billions of dollars’ worth of damage!

Often, these plants behave well on your own property; the damage is done as they escape to natural areas through bird droppings or other means. This is more than an aesthetic problem. These invasive plants damage our ecosystems and are a prime threat to the biodiversity of our planet. First, do no harm: resolve to eliminate these invasive plants!

Good stewardship of God’s creation

There are many ways church and home landscapes can restore habitat for God’s creatures and create a healthy, joyful place for people to enjoy God’s creation. But first, honor the integrity of God’s creation and do no harm. Eliminate pesticides and invasive plants from your church and home landscapes this summer!

Update: NY IP&L

June 2004 - Food for Thought

“Clean your plate. Think of all those starving children in China.”

How many of us grew up with this admonition! How many of us sat there staring at some despised food pondering how cleaning our plate could possibly help those children! Our clean plate may not have helped those children, but Mom was correct to focus on food. Our personal food choices DO make a difference in the world.

Personal food choices

Here are some ways our personal food choices can promote justice:

Food and church life

Here are some ways food choices in your church life can promote justice:

Good for us, too

Fad diets aside, doctors recommend increasing our consumption of whole grains and produce and decreasing our consumption of meat. Once again, justice for the earth and earth’s peoples is also good for us!

July-August 2004 - Charity and Justice

“...and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.” – Micah 6:8.

Charity. Giving out of kindness and compassion. As Christians, we believe this is something we are called to do. We are a generous and compassionate people, both as Christians and as Americans. We give billions of dollars to charity, and volunteer millions of hours of our time.

A few years ago, though, I began to think differently about charity. NOT that charity wasn’t a good thing, but that it wasn’t the only thing. Maybe it wasn’t the whole story.

I was watching a video called God’s Creation and Global Warming, and one of the segments covered Hurricane Mitch, which occurred in 1998. This disaster left thousands dead and millions of people in need.

In the video, we see the generosity and compassion of Christians and Americans. Planeloads of food, clothes, and other supplies arrived. This, of course, was a wonderful thing and helped these people with their immediate needs.

But as the viewer sees these planeloads of donations arrive, Paz Artaza-Regan, of the General Board of Church and Society talks about the difference between charity and justice. This immediate outpouring of kindness and compassion was necessary, but justice is also required. Justice requires living our lives in such a way that these disasters might never occur in the first place.

A hurricane may seem to be an odd example of an avoidable disaster. Hurricanes have occurred for millions of years and will probably always occur. But we’ve added something new since the Industrial Revolution: global warming. One of the predicted consequences of global warming is an increase in the frequency and severity of weather events like hurricanes.

Whether Hurricane Mitch in particular was due to global warming cannot be known, but we do know that disasters like that one along with droughts and flooding, heat spells and cold waves, the northward spread of infectious diseases, sea level rise and more will become more frequent with further global warming.

Justice requires that we do more than just show compassion to the victims of global warming and other environmental problems. Justice requires that we do something about global warming.

You might say: “Why churches in particular?” Why is what churches do so important?

Because society looks to us for moral leadership. What the faith community says and, more importantly, what the faith community does, influences what the rest of society thinks and does.

Global warming and other environmental issues - pollution of the oceans and depletion of its fisheries, deforestation, extinction of creatures created by God, and many others - are the modern-day equivalents of issues in the past where the faith community has made a difference. Just as with the abolition of slavery and the civil rights movement, today’s environmental problems are religious, moral, and spiritual issues.

One way the faith community is responding is by participating in a newly-formed interfaith organization called New York Interfaith Power & Light. This organization promotes good stewardship of God’s gift of energy by asking congregations to sign a covenant to conserve energy and use it more efficiently, and then ultimately use some of the savings to buy clean, renewable energy. Taking these actions will make a powerful statement to the rest of society and will demonstrate our desire for justice.

September 2004 - Teaching our teens

It’s not easy being a teen today. Cool or Christian? All for me or justice for all? Those are often the choices teens feel they must make in today’s pop culture. Do our Christian Education programs help our teens make these choices?

An important part of our United Methodist heritage concerns social and environmental justice. Discuss these topics with your teens. Then help them take action. Teens are old enough and energetic enough to really make a difference. These ideas and experiences can help them grow as Christians and as United Methodists.

Here are some ideas and resources to get you started:

Commercialism and materialism: Teens are the target of enormous pressure from peers and advertisers to buy, buy, buy. Implicitly or explicitly, our pop culture – sometimes even family and friends! – convey the message that more and more stuff is what makes people happy in life. Are we helping teens understand the difference between “the good life” and God’s offer of an abundant life?

The Center for a New American Dream (CNAD) is a good resource for exploring this topic. Their teen program, “I Buy Different,” has materials on consumerism and suggests actions teens can take for social and environmental justice.

Teens could also choose actions from CNAD’s Faith-based Purchasing handbook. For example, they could help your church plan to purchase and serve Fair Trade, shade-grown, organic coffee, tea, and cocoa. This and other actions are opportunities to explore how our purchases of daily items affect people around the world and the earth itself. (More info at Equal Exchange.)

Teens can tackle the commercialism of Christmas with CNAD’s Simplify the Holidays campaign. After some discussion, they could lead church families in celebrating Christmas with more joy and less stuff.

Stuff: The Secret Lives of Everyday Things by John Ryan and Alan Durning is a small but fascinating book, and there is a curriculum guide. The chapters on “The Secret Life of the Shoe” or the “Secret Life of French Fries” would be especially interesting for teens and would give them memorable examples of the impacts of our consumer choices.

CROP Walk: Teens often participate in the annual CROP walk, but why not explore the consequences of our personal food choices in the weeks surrounding the walk? Study how our personal food choices affect people and the planet and then take action throughout the year, such as reducing meat consumption.

Time: Time is an issue for individuals, families, and communities, and it’s especially relevant for teens with the pressures of school, work, and other activities. Do they have time for family and friends, time to care for the earth, time for a spiritual life? One resource is the book of short essays called "Take Back Your Time" by John DeGraaf, and the Take Back Your Time website. Invite parents to the Sunday school class to talk about how the lack of time affects their personal, family, and community lives.

UM Seminar:  The highlight of their year could be participating in a UM Church and Society seminar at the historic United Methodist building right in DC. Church and Society staff can work with you to customize a seminar for your group. This experience has been life-changing for many people over the years.

Being a teen was never easy for anyone. Despite all our material wealth, though, it may be more difficult than ever before to be a teen in our complicated world. Are we giving our teens enough guidance? Enough challenge? Enough inspiration to help them choose justice, not just stuff? We must help our teens examine justice issues from a Christian perspective, and then help them take action to work for justice. These Senior High Sunday School experiences can make their Christian values and ideals real for them and be the foundation for their adult lives.

October 2004 - Caring about children

We’ve all seen it. A pregnant woman smoking or drinking. Parents smoking around young children, who are breathing that secondhand smoke.

What’s wrong with them? Haven’t they heard that smoking and drinking hurts their unborn children? Don’t they know that secondhand smoke harms children even more than it harms adults? It’s maddening to see because we know these behaviors hurt children.

What’s wrong with them? Don’t they know? Don’t they care?

United Methodists caring for children

United Methodists do care about children’s health, and I doubt there are many Methodists making these destructive choices. But there are other invisible ways we’re harming children’s health. They’re invisible because they’re so much a part of daily life that we don’t give them a second thought.

Once we know about these problems, we can make the world much healthier for children by lifestyle changes such as the following:

Lawn pesticides One of the most common invisible threats to children’s health is the aesthetic use of pesticides – pesticides (herbicides and insecticides) used solely to create a pretty lawn or prevent leaf damage on ornamental plants. Research shows these products are linked to cancer, reproductive problems, and neurological diseases. Children are especially vulnerable. And the inert ingredients in these products are often at least as harmful as the active ingredients. If we care about children, how can we justify using pesticides? The tragic irony is that it’s quite easy to have a decent lawn and beautiful garden without using any of these poisons!

Power plants Smog. Soot. Mercury. All these and others are pollutants produced by power plants – and all cause health problems for everyone, but especially for children. These pollutants result in more asthma attacks, reduced lung function, neurological problems, and other serious illnesses. We can easily reduce the amount of electricity we use, and thus, the amount of power generated and the pollution created. For example, a compact fluorescent bulb will use only about one-fourth the electricity used by an incandescent bulb. Even better, for about the cost of a pizza each month, we can purchase renewable energy and stop generating these pollutants altogether.

Transportation Most of us consider style, safety, and price when we buy a vehicle, but do we consider the health consequences of our choice? Smog, soot, carbon monoxide, and other toxics created by our vehicles harm children’s health. An interesting real-world experiment occurred during the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta when the city reduced traffic and used public transportation instead. The rate of childhood asthma incidents fell dramatically during this period!

There are no pollution-free vehicles yet, but there are big differences in the amount of pollution vehicles produce. In general, the better the gas mileage, the less harmful pollution is created. Hybrids are an obvious choice for good gas mileage, and SUVs and other large vehicles are generally the poorest choices. Beyond gas mileage, though, some vehicles produce even fewer emissions. For example, the original Prius was a SULEV (super ultra-low emissions vehicle), and the current second generation hybrid is a PZEV (partial zero emissions vehicle). When you choose these kinds of vehicles, you’ll generate even fewer of the pollutants that harm children’s health.

Children’s first environment  Children have a right to have a healthy first environment - the womb - and a healthy first food - breast milk. And yet these are contaminated by all the poisons found in the environment – pesticides, dioxin, mercury, PCBs, dry cleaning fluid, and many, many more. In fact, breast milk commonly violates FDA action levels for poisonous substances in food. IMPORTANT NOTE: This does NOT mean that mothers should stop breastfeeding their babies. Breastfeeding is the best food for babies for a host of reasons. Exposure to these toxins during pregnancy is an even greater risk. The solution is to eliminate these poisons from the environment, not to stop breastfeeding!

Justice for children

United Methodists do care about children and would not knowingly harm their health. We now know about the harm the above practices cause everyone, but especially children. Let’s now make healthy choices both in our personal lives and in the institutional lives of our churches for the sake of all the world’s children.

November 2004 - Water woes world wide

One of the themes at Chautauqua Institution last summer was “Water Woes World Wide.”

How can we live on Earth - the Water Planet - and have a shortage of water? We all learned in elementary school that there is a fixed amount of water and it continually recycles. How can there be a water crisis if we still have all the water that there ever was?

Part of the answer is that less than one percent of all the planet’s water is fresh water available for use, and that water isn’t equally distributed over the earth. Part of the answer is that we are increasingly polluting the fresh water we do have. And finally, an ever-increasing number of people are sharing that same amount of water.

We in upstate New York feel quite insulated from this problem. We take for granted our easy access to clean, cheap water. Nevertheless, the world indeed has “water woes world wide.”

Our UMC Social Principles affirm, “The water on this planet is a sacred gift from God” and urges actions to “ensure that water remains pure and available to all.” Thus, the main water issues are quality, availability, and affordability.

Quality Eighty percent of disease in two-thirds of the world is related to poor drinking water and sanitation. Water is being increasingly polluted by municipal, agricultural, mining, and industrial wastes. Our own Onondaga and Erie Lakes are examples. (By the way, bottled water is not the solution: this industry is not regulated as is municipal water, so there is no guarantee of its safety. And some bottled water is simply municipal water.)

Availability It is predicted that half of the world’s poorest countries will face moderate or severe shortages of water by 2025. Some seas, such as the Aral (once the fourth largest inland sea), have been drying up. Some rivers, such as the Colorado, no longer reach the sea, changing areas that had been lush wilderness into mud. Water scarcity is the single biggest threat to global food production, and global warming will exacerbate this problem.

Affordability Even when there is fresh, clean water available, will any but the wealthiest people be able to afford it? One of the most frightening prospects is the increasing privatization of water. Water, like air, is necessary for life. Should multinational companies be allowed to own the world’s water – this sacred gift from God?

The Great Lakes Did you know that our Great Lakes have one fifth of the world’s fresh water and 95% of the US supply? Corporations have repeatedly tried to buy this water and sell it to other parts of the world. We in Upstate New York have a special responsibility to protect this gift of fresh, clean water for the future.

What we can do

* Learn more about water. Some resources are Sandra Postel’s books, Blue Gold by Maude Barlow, and Cadillac Desert by Marc Reisner.

* Be an advocate! Speak up for water quality and equitable distribution. Monitor developments regarding our Great Lakes and the privatization of water worldwide. Ensure that your community repairs leaky distribution pipes, which can often waste huge quantities of water.

* Treat water as a “sacred gift from God!”

- Surprisingly, one of the best ways to reduce water use is by reducing meat consumption. Newsweek once noted that “the amount of water that goes into a 1,000 pound steer would float a destroyer.”

- Water lawns less frequently or better yet, reduce lawn area. And avoid pesticides and fertilizers, which run off into our waters.

- Fix any leaks we may have in faucets and toilets, and buy low-flow showerheads and faucets.

December 2004 - The debate is over; the work begins

Except for the politicians and the fossil fuel industry, the debate is over.

The vast majority of scientists agree not only that global warming is happening, but that it’s due to our use of fossil fuel. What’s more, it’s happening much faster than anticipated. (* See note below for more information on the science.)

How will we - stewards of God’s creation - respond? Will we respond to this crisis or will we take the easier path of ignoring it? There is a window of opportunity for us to take action, but that window is fast closing.

General Conference 2004 Resolutions

The 2004 General Conference affirmed that the UMC supports measures calling for the reduction of carbon dioxide, methane, nitrogen oxides, and sulfur dioxide, which contribute to acid rain and global climate change. The UMC also calls for a sustainable national energy policy (Resolution #7). We can be advocates for these and other policies from the UM Power website. For the record, consistent with this Resolution, we oppose the Energy Policy Act and support the McCain-Lieberman Climate Stewardship Act. These will undoubtedly come up for a vote again.

Closer to home is Resolution #11, which encourages United Methodist institutions to perform energy audits, improve energy efficiency, and pursue use of alternative clean energy sources such as wind and solar power where available. Actually, getting a low-cost/no-cost NYSERDA-sponsored energy audit makes so much financial sense for a congregation that it’s easy to forget that it also promotes climate justice.

An interfaith effort to prevent global warming and power plant pollution in New York State is New York Interfaith Power and Light. Becoming a member is easy: just sign the Congregational Covenant on the website and pledge to take action. One action, of course, is to get a NYSERDA energy audit. Details about this audit are on the website.

Our history

The United Methodist Church (and its predecessors) and other Christian churches were instrumental in the abolition of slavery, in passing child labor laws, in the civil rights movement, and in other justice issues. We’re proud of this tradition of working for justice.

And yet within this proud tradition, not all churches participated. In fact, some were hostile to these movements. For example, one church in Syracuse (not Methodist) began as an offshoot of an established congregation in the late 1800s. Why? Because the original congregation opposed the abolition of slavery whereas the members of the breakaway congregation felt called to work to end slavery.

We all now recognize the importance of the civil rights movement and shudder when we hear accounts of people suffering indignities such as being required to use different water fountains, for example, because of the color of their skin. And yet, in my own Methodist church in the 1960s, some people left our congregation when my minister participated in Civil Rights marches.

Now

Today, we are at a similar crossroads with global warming. Are we choosing to be like the church that worked for the abolition of slavery … or to continue it? Will we be like the church that worked to achieve civil rights … or to continue segregation?

Will we be the church that works to prevent further global warming with its injustices and misery for people all over the world, for future generations, and for all of God’s creation? Or will we choose to be the church that ignores it? Will we be good stewards of God’s creation … or not? The choice is ours. The time is now.

* For more information:

Yes, you’ll find many websites, books, and radio programs proclaiming global warming to be a myth perpetuated by the mainstream media, and they dispute the conclusion of thousands of the world’s top climate scientists that global warming is real. Most members of this tiny group of naysayers are backed by the fossil fuel industry.